Multilayer ceramic capacitors are structured such that dielectric layers and internal electrode layers are alternately layered. These multilayer ceramic capacitors are widely used as electronic components that are small in size but has a large capacitance and a high reliability.
The material of the dielectric used in such capacitors is required to have high relative dielectric constant, small dielectric loss, and good temperature characteristics.
To meat such requirements, there has been a proposal of using barium titanate of which X-ray diffraction chart is such that the ratio (I(200)/Ib) of the peak intensity I(200) at 2θ(200) to the diffraction intensity (Ib) at a midpoint angle between the peak angle 2θ(002) of the diffraction line derived from the (002) plane and the peak angle 2θ(200) of the diffraction line derived from the (200) plane is 4 to 16 (see Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2001-345230).
However, according to this method, when dielectric layers are formed from particles having a large variation in particle size, the resultant multilayer ceramic capacitor may exhibit a large decline in capacitance upon application of a DC voltage (hereinafter referred to as DC bias characteristics).
When such a multilayer ceramic capacitor is mounted in a circuit and a DC voltage is applied, the capacitance lowers significantly, presenting a problem of the capacitor being unable to perform its function as designed.
Thus, the relative dielectric constant of the material of the dielectric layers may be lowered to produce a multilayer ceramic capacitor having excellent DC bias characteristics. In this case, however, enlarging the capacitance of the multilayer ceramic capacitor is not possible.